The Internet is a decentralized public network of electronic devices that are communicatively connected together on a global scale. A message can be sent from any electronic device on the Internet to any other electronic device simply by specifying a targeted destination address for the message at transmission. The message will likely experience a series of intermediary devices, such as bridges and routers, which receive the message in transit, determine the intended destination of the message, and continue routing the message to its intended destination.
The popularity and use of the Internet continues to increase at a rapid rate. Since the introduction of the World Wide Web, referred to as the “Web,” most Internet users are provided with a graphical user interface (GUI) to the Internet, which allows the users to access Web pages stored on servers located worldwide. These “Web pages” feature text and graphics and are generally described, in terms of layout and content, by way of a programming language known as HyperText Markup Language (HTML).
A software program, known as a “browser,” is executed at an electronic device controlled by the user (referred to as a “client device”) and enables the user to control the access and viewing of these Web pages by either (i) specifying the location, namely the targeted Internet address of the desired Web page, or (ii) “linking” to Web pages. The desired Web page is specified by a uniform resource locator (URL), which indicates the precise location of the HTML file. “Linking,” however, is accomplished by the desired Web page containing, in addition to textual and visual data specified in HTML format, embedded information referred to as “links” in the form of URLs that point to Internet addresses of other Web pages. These other Web pages are often maintained on other electronic devices throughout the Internet.
The user, by selecting a link or an image embedded with a link (often by selecting the link or image with an input device), accesses content within other Web pages, which can in turn contain further data and/or additional links. When a Web page is accessed, its information is transmitted across the Internet to the client device accessed by the user.
Over the last few years, more and more data centers have emerged for hosting multimedia content, such as video files, for public viewing. Video files normally have extremely high storage and bandwidth requirements. In particular, video files can be very large, from approximately a few megabytes and up to one gigabyte or more.
In order to play back a video file at a client device, a web server storing the video file normally receives a request for the video file and downloads the entire (or a substantial part of the) video file to the client device for temporary storage prior to playback. This is done in order to avoid jerky display of the video file. However, in most cases when surfing the Web, only a small portion of the video file is viewed, and thus, the downloading of the entire (or a substantial part of the) video file wastes bandwidth. This wasted bandwidth translates into added expenses incurred by the data centers.
Moreover, due to an increasing number of electronic devices that are adapted to display video in different formats and resolutions, the web servers are being required to support and maintain a larger number of video files. It is not uncommon to store multiple copies of a particular video in order to accommodate different formats and resolutions. Otherwise, some electronic devices will not be able to view the hosted video files, which would result in a loss of realized revenue by the data center. This repetitive storage of video files poses a number of problems.
For instance, as the number of copies of video files increases over time, the host site will experience more difficulty in managing its video files. Also, as new formats and resolutions are supported by the host site, legacy videos also will need to be pre-processed to support the new format(s) and/or resolution(s) if access to the video file by an electronic device supporting this format and/or resolution is permitted.
Accordingly, a need exists for a system capable of providing improved access to audio/video content on the Internet or another general purpose network. Such a system would take steps to ensure that content is delivered properly through dynamic adjustment of various characteristics of the content based on the attributes of the client device.